Springboks wanted to be brave and bold with ball in hand against Barbarians, says captain Jesse Kriel

It rained almost non-stop in Cape Town this week, and when more grey skies greeted the Mother City on Saturday, you were expecting the worst as a rugby fan.

Despite the Barbarians being in town for what is usually a festival-type running-rugby game, the slippery conditions would’ve been expected to affect both teams’ approach at Cape Town Stadium.

But the Boks actually didn’t hold back in that regard in their 54-7 victory over the invitation side to entertain the 45,000-strong crowd.

As early as the fourth minute, there were an array of impressive passes from the home side that would’ve been expected from the visitors.

The South Africans put together a series of phases, with Lood de Jager running hard a few times, debutant prop Asenathi Ntlabakanye showcasing his deft handling skills, and Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu slinging out a long pass to Kurt-Lee Arendse out wide.

Lively scrumhalf Morné van den Berg also kept the tempo going with some slick clearances from the base, and the one audacious dummy from Feinberg-Mngomezulu had his Cape fans dancing in the stands.

Fullback Aphelele Fassi also entered the attack chat, and delivered two delicious grubbers that set up the first two tries by Malcolm Marx and Cheslin Kolbe.

Arendse and Kolbe were energetic throughout the eight-try rout, and that attack-minded theme continued into the second half, with captain Jesse Kriel breaking the line, and centre partner Damian de Allende pushing through a deft grubber for Arendse’s touchdown.

The Tony Brown playbook was on full show, and the growth in the Bok game in such dreary conditions speaks volumes about how they are pushing the envelope ahead of the blockbuster two Tests against the All Blacks in New Zealand in September.

“I’m obviously very happy with all of that. I think it actually started in the week. On Wednesday, we spoke about our mindset and mentality going into training – whether we are going to let the weather affect us or not. I think it was nothing different today,” Kriel said in the post-match press conference.

“We came in here positive. We wanted to be brave and bold with the ball in hand, and I think we looked dangerous with turnover ball.

“It’s always great if you get the ball into guys like Fassi, Cheslin and Kurt-Lee’s hands.

“They are special rugby players, and they can make something out of nothing. Ja, I think we saw a lot of that today.”

Bok coach Rassie Erasmus said afterwards that he was “satisfied” with the performance, but felt that they had gone a bit too far on attack at times in the wet weather.

But the South Africans are on the right trajectory heading into next Saturday’s first Test against Italy at Loftus Versfeld.

“We won’t get carried away with a game like this. We know it’s a festival game and we are playing at home against a team that only practiced a few times together,” Erasmus said.

“But certain things came through. We want to get better in the next matches that we will play, where we are trying to focus a lot on us.

“When we hit the Rugby Championship – and Georgia will also be a grind…

“If the weather was drier, I think some of the line-breaks and half-gaps that we got, we were a bit ambitious in trying to offload and just force the last pass. In dry weather, I think that could’ve stuck.

“But after halftime, when the guys spoke about that, they toned it down a little bit, and we played a little bit more conservatively and got more points.

“So, I guess we’ll get used to this weather if we get that again, but we can’t wait to play on a dry pitch and still improve on our attack.”

Points-Scorers

Springboks 54 – Tries: Malcolm Marx, Cheslin Kolbe, Vincent Tshituka (2), Jan-Hendrik Wessels, Kurt-Lee Arendse, Lood de Jager, Damian de Allende. Conversions: Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu (2), Manie Libbok (5).

Barbarians 7 – Try: Melvyn Jaminet. Conversion: Jaminet (1).